Art Sometimes, Thursday, August 15, 2013

Good Evening,

It's been a hell of a week.  Is it over yet?  Here is the piece I made yesterday but could not load up because my internet was down.  Now, after too many hours on the phone arguing with internet and phone companies, I have internet again and I'm loading it up today.  Sometimes, today at least, I wish I lived a quieter, simpler life.

This piece began with the flower. There is a long story behind it, but lets just say that it's mine, from a long time ago.  I had just the one so I wanted to highlight it.  I find it very interesting that in sea of black, white and red, this little stylized Hibiscus bloom can still manage to bring the feeling of the islands to this small piece.

And that is all I've got to say about that,

Till tomorrow,

Heather

 

 

Art Every Day, Tuesday, August 13, 2013,

Good Evening,

Here is today's new piece and she's a doozey!  It began with a piece of fine wale corduroy that I painted with thickened dyes using a roller for the pink areas and a piece of decorative metal as a stencil with black dye in the remaining areas.  There are some bits of yellow dye floating around in there too.

So, I ripped the corduroy into a large rectangle and laid it down on some pink dyed bamboo felt.  I topped the corduroy with a strip of yellow cotton and placed a square of hot pink jacquard cotton on top of it.  I quilted the pink areas of the corduroy with close set wavy lines in a matching thread color then I stitched in the white grid of the black stenciled areas.  I top stitched the yellow and hot pink down in black then couched on ripped, twisted strips of a black hand dyed cotton to form the central spiral and the black frame.  Lastly, I glued on the six circular, yellow bone beads. 

The piece ended up much bolder than I thought it would, very graphic too.  I think that the balance would be better if I added just a bit of yellow next to the two horizontal corners of the hot pink square. I think I'll do that in the morning.  Now it's off to bed.

Till tomorrow,

Heather

 

Art Every Day, Monday, August 12, 2013

Good Morning,

Here is today's new piece.  It began with a dark gray dye painted batting which I topped with some black linen, some red embroidered cotton, a bit of a hand painted piece of fabric and some blue silk noil.  I cut a bunch of flowers out of the embroidered cotton and set them aside.

I stitched the red down with a smallish stipple then added wavy horizontal lines in the painted piece.  I  switched to a blue thread and stitched the blue squares down with concentric squares.  Then I stippled the black and laid out the flowers which I stitched down with small circles in their middles.

I love the play of the delicate flowers against the bold color way and the highly graphic hand painted fabric.  It was my intent to see how that contradiction would work and I quite like it. 

Till tomorrow,

Heather

 

Art Almost Every Day, Yesterday's Piece, Sunday, August 11, 2013

Good Morning,

Here I am, a day late and a dollar short.... sometimes it's just the story of my life.

I taught a rather large class yesterday at the end of a very tough week and my  hands just hurt too much yesterday evening to even think about doing a piece.  Excuses, excuses!

So this morning I made two, and here is the first.  It began with light pink dyed Bamboo felt which I topped with some dark pink cotton, some wide strips of hand painted fabrics set vertically and some pieced yellow green and white strips set horizontally.

I quilted the background with a stipple in a matching thread color then top stitched around the painted strips and stitched up the middle of the hot pink swirls.  Then I switched to a blue thread and stitched around the perimeter of the yellow green/white pieced units and added short wavy lines along one edge of the yellow green segments.  Finally, I added the bold black swirl using a rather heavy black linen.  

I really like the interaction of the painted fabric with the striped fabric and the background color.  The complementary combination is just so joyous.  I thought that adding the black swirl would spice the whole thing up just enough to make it sing, but alas, the fabric I chose is just so thick and heavy that not only would it not twist up smoothly, it is also doing it's best to overwhelm the entirety of the piece.  Had I used a regular cotton for the black swirl I believe that it would be highlighting the swirls in the painted fabric rather than squashing them.

Now, on to today's entry.......

Heather

Art Every Day, Saturday, August 10, 2013

Good Evening,
Here is today's new piece. As my good friend I.V. said when she saw it this afternoon, it's low contrast.  I've had these toned reds with gray fabrics for quite some time and I think I used them once before really early in the year.  I think they are very interesting, but not really pretty so it's a challenge to use them. They have a hard time playing with others so I figured out how to use them alone.
I layered up two of them in the background, one cotton and one silk noil then I topped them with a piece of jute.  I topped the jute with some silk gauze then twisted up a strip of the cotton and free motion couched it down into the swirl.
I cut away the excess silk gauze so that it just filled the swirl and a scant 1/8" or so hung out around the perimeter.  Next, I fought with my machine as I stitched the off set circles in the darker red area then stitched interlocking squares and rectangles in the lighter red area.
I like the smokey look to the whole thing especially the dark gray gauze inside the swirl.  Though I've played with these swirls a lot, this is the first time I filled one with a different fabric from the background.
The piece has a nice, simple balance with it's one focal point and the quilting is adding some lovely visual texture to an otherwise too staid background.  I think the fringe along the bottom edge of the jute is adding just the right bit of tension to keep the piece from being too simple.
Till tomorrow,
Heather

 

Art Every Day, Friday, August 9, 2013,

Good Afternoon,

I tried hard to get this done in time for a Good Morning salutation, but I got side tracked at the studio! I wanted to do something hyper-modern so I chose a black & white & red color way.  I began with white fabric on a gray/black batting.  Then I put some Misty Fuse on the back of a black/dark gray hand dye and cut it into some very fine, 1/8" wide strips.  I positioned the strips in the lines you see above then ironed and stitched them down.  I then stitched all of the white background with straightish lines about 1/8" apart.  The lines move in different directions in each section, varying from horizontal to vertical to diagonal.  Then I stitched the small red circles, the red zig-zags then finished with the large red circles which are heavily thread painted.

The piece did exactly what I expected to do - made me happy!  Sometimes I really enjoy a fine, tight design filled with angles and lines then softened to a certain degree with some circles.  The graphic appeal of this is what I was hoping for.  It's been a long while since I worked in black & white.

Till tomorrow,

Heather

 

Art Every Day, Thursday, Aug 8, 2013

Good Evening,

Here is today's new piece.  I taught the first part of an introductory free motion class this afternoon and it got me jonesing to do some myself.  I mentioned the other day that I didn't have any stuff at home to make my dailies with so while straightening up at the studio Tuesday I selected a bunch of scraps from my bunch of "uglies" (I pretty much get the stuff from the dye pot that is damaged, ugly, or unsaleable for what ever reason) and took them home with me to bone up my supply there.  My little stash included several pieces of fabrics with stamped designs along with a bunch of left over blocks that I made when putting together a free style pieced quilt a while back.  So, you'll be seeing some of those leftovers over the next few weeks.  I've been really busy at the studio during the day, so like yesterday, I made this piece at home.

Now, on with the critique.  I began with the three leaf stamps and ripped them so that there was as little background showing as possible.  I ripped three pieces of contrasting fabrics to lay beneath the stamped blocks then ripped a piece of background fabric.  I layered the green background on top of green batting then "scattered" the darker blue and violet rectangles then placed the stamped blocks on top of those, sort of kattywampus. 

 The leaf prints are stitched along their outline and down the center vein then the blocks are outlined and so are the blocks behind them.  All of this was done with a medium blue green tone of thread (remember that tones go well with a mix of colors).  Then, I went a little overboard on the quilting in the green negative space.  I repeated the two motifs that are contained within the leaves; squiggly lines and swirls.  I like the quilting, but even though it's done in a thread color that is just a bit darker than the fabric, it's so decorative that it begins to overwhelm the quietude of the drifting leaves as it pulls the background into the mid ground.   I knew this was going to happen, but I wanted to quilt it decoratively anyway.  I wanted to serve myself with the pleasure of free motioning more than I wanted to serve this little quilt!

Till tomorrow,

Heather